


The Scribe

by Khaelis



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Love Confessions, Love Letters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 19:33:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29846418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khaelis/pseuds/Khaelis
Summary: Eivor is good at flyting.She's not as good at writing.
Relationships: Eivor/Randvi (Assassin's Creed)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 58





	The Scribe

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't written anything in ages, but I think this ship will be my new addiction for the forseeable future.
> 
> It's not as fluffy as I wanted it to be, but who knows, I might just add something to that at some point.
> 
> Thanks for reading - and thank you to everyone who posts Eivor/Randvi works, you always make my days better!

* * *

Eivor had always been good with her words. Her thoughts almost always translated into witty verses and beautiful prose naturally. She was a master of flyting and there was yet a decent opponent to be found, in England and Norway alike. Convince, lie, defend a point of view or refute another, her voice was as much of a weapon as her axe. She was good with words. It should have been easy.

But somehow, for weeks, months, her thoughts hadn’t translated into anything. Everything she thought of at night when sleep wouldn’t come, everything she wondered about during interminable longboat journeys, she couldn’t voice any of it. It wasn’t for lack of trying. She has accumulated countless stacks of papers, some quickly scribbled, some entirely darkened with ink, some torn and rumpled. She feared she would run out of hiding places in her room but she couldn’t bring herself to burn any of them - who knew, maybe she’d read through past notes and realise they weren’t half as bad as she had thought.

Writing was the only way she had found to try and put words on what she felt. She thought it might have been easier. It wasn't.

“You are not a scribe, Wolf-Kissed,” Gunnar told her with a pained shake of the head.

Her fingers crushed the feather she was holding out of frustration at her inability to use even the simplest of phrases and a weary groan left her lips.

“I am sure Randvi will not mind the quality of the message as much as its contents.”

Eivor hoped the red she was sure coloured her cheeks could be blamed on the cold air whistling around them as they just sailed past Donecaestre. 

“What makes you think Randvi is the intended recipient?” she retorted, her gruff voice enough to hide her embarrassment. Because it was for Randvi indeed, but she would rather remain the only one privy to the fact. 

“You wish to tell her about the success of the raid, do you not? Although I fail to understand. We will have reached Raventhorpe long before a scout can deliver the news.”

“Then it might be I am not writing about the raid. Do I worry about the kind of cloth you use to make your weapon shine?”

“The Wolf shows her fangs,” Gunnar chuckled before he went back to polishing the sharp blade of his axe. “I shall let you write your saga in peace. Until you run out of feathers.”

Silently thankful Gunnar would not interrupt again or insist to know the purpose of the message, Eivor dropped the broken feather at her feet - it was quickly snatched by a white paw. She rummaged through a sack of various supplies they had acquired during the raid, but there was no new feather to be found.She gave a frustrated grunt and decided she had nor the courage nor the skill needed to write what weighed on her mind.

She leaned back against the column of the stern and closed her eyes, a grimace creasing her brow. At least, writing, or the idea of writing, had helped her forget about the nagging pain just above her hip. Her words hadn’t been lacking when she roared at the Saxon who threw his sword against her side and when she expelled inventive curses at Gunnar for making an armor unadapted to close combat.  _ And if you're unable to climb up walls and rocks because the armour is too stiff, you'll curse me, too _ , she had heard among the chaos of battle. This truth made her even angrier - an anger that partly assured them a quick victory over their Saxon enemies.

Eivor spent the rest of the voyage quiet on the outside, but inside, the thoughts and feelings she couldn’t imprison on paper raged.

***

Randvi froze for a second when she heard a throat clearing just behind her. She quickly regained her composure and hurried to shove every bit of paper she had been holding in her lockbox, engraved with a beautiful raven. The soft smile on her face disappeared to give way to her usually serious expression.

“Eivor is back, Randvi,” one of her scouts informed her. “Everyone alive, but Eivor was wounded. They will dock very soon. Valka is already waiting.”

“Thank you. Take a day to rest before I send you to Jórvik.”

“Very well.”

Randvi waited for the sound of steps to vanish in the distance and let the worry fill her heart. Was it nothing? Was it bad? A scratch or a missing limb? The drengr could survive a lot of injuries and rarely complained about any of them - so much so they often remained unnoticed. But if her scout knew about it, then it meant it was too serious to be kept hidden. 

If Eivor died…

Randvi ignored the gnawing feeling of uncertainty and carefully put the lockbox back on its shelf.

_ You will not die before you speak each of these words to me, Wolf-Kissed. I will drag you back here from Valhalla if I must. _

She blew the candle next to the map out - a habit she had taken after one of her first precious maps caught fire and it took a whole week to draw again, and she made her way to the docks. A crowd was already gathered, and instead of the usual clamour and negotiations to decide who would get what resource, only whispers broke the silence.

Randvi wanted to run, crawl her way through the mass and see for herself. She needed to be sure. She needed to see. But she also knew that if she started running, panic would follow in her steps too closely. So she approached with measured steps while her heart was galloping against her chest. 

“I’m fine!” the raucous voice whined above the whispers. “Nothing a bit of sleep won’t heal. Let me walk to my room, will you?”

Randvi inwardly sighed of relief at the loud protests falling from Eivor’s mouth. At least she was awake.  _ Alive _ .

Alive and awake, but unwell.

Randvi winced when she saw her try to take a few steps forward but ended up tripping on a rope, her fall only stopped by the strong arms of Gunnar and Birna. She got closer and with all the authority she could muster in that moment, she asked:

“What happened?”

“A poisoned blade caught her unaware as we fought our way up to the chapel,” Gunnar explained, hoisting the weak drengr upward with a roll of his powerful shoulders. “She was fine at first, but she started sleeping like a runestone soon after we left Donecaestre behind. I do not think the poison deadly and the wound is shallow.”

“Nothing I cannot heal,” Valka interrupted as she pressed her palm against Eivor’s forehead and lifted her eyelids to see her eyes. “Bring her to my hut. Randvi, remember those flowers I gave you yesterday? Bring them to me.”

Feeling like she had been tasked with an important mission, Randvi didn't waste any time executing the order. It was only mere minutes later that she was stepping into the warm hut that smelled of herbs and roots, a small cauldron quietly bubbling in a corner. She handed the bunch of bright yellow flowers to Valka, who simply put them down on a table.

“Thank you Randvi, but I do not need them,” the seeress smiled, her bone necklace clicking as she bent over Eivor to draw a fur over her body. “I did not want you clinging to my back. Do not fret, Eivor will heal quickly.”

“Is she awake?”

“Barely. It will take some time for the salve to drain the poison from her body completely. I need to go harvest more herbs in the forest. You can stay here with her if you wish.”

“Thank you, Valka.”

The seeress nodded, wrapped a fur around her shoulders and took the long wooden stick in the corner of the room.

“Eivor had something for you,” she added, pointing her chin at the table. “It was tucked in a piece of her armour. You should tell her, before the whole country runs out of paper.”

Randvi stared at the paper - not unlike the stock she safely kept in her lockbox. If what was on that paper was similar to the ones she had found...

Her cheeks brightened and embarrassment crept in her veins. She wanted to tell Valka she had no idea what is what, no clue about its contents, but the fact that she refused to read it in front of her spoke louder than words.

“I am a seeress, dear,” Valka grinned before she made her way to the door. “I see things. And I see it will not be long before either of you bursts into flames if you both keep your feelings secret. I shall be back before night falls.”

Randvi remained quiet, unable to protest or deny what they both knew. With a trembling hand, she carefully picked up the folded piece of paper and opened it to reveal its message. Not the longest, but not the shortest either. Eivor was getting better. Unlike the messages she kept in her box, this message did not bother with a greeting. It was raw in shape but the meaning had never been any clearer. 

_ My love for you is like a day in Valhalla. Sweet, beautiful, and ever constant. It never falters. It never hurts. But in afterlife, no thing is physical. I know not even death could change the love I feel. But I know I can only experience it fully here, in Midgard. I long for your touch, your smell, your heat. I long for what makes you human. I want to hold you. I want to run my fingers through your hair. I want to breathe in the perfume of your neck. I want to know what all of those things feel like, so I can bring the memories with me on my last journey. Only then can I go in peace. _

“You were not supposed to read that, Randvi,” Eivor groaned weakly, barely managing to lift and arm to try and take the paper from her hands.

“Well, I did,” Randvi said. Her soft voice carried a smile the drenrg heard even through her fuzzy ears. “Just like I read a few dozen others like this one. This is the most beautiful I have read so far.”

“A dozen others?”

“Mouse may have accidentally played with the pillowcase you kept under your bed. And dragged it into the map room, thus leaving a trail of paper through the longhouse. I had to pick them up, or someone else would have. They were for me anyway, were they not?”

“Whatever is on those papers… I wanted to  _ say  _ it to you, not  _ write _ it.”

“I understand.”

Randvi sat on the mattress next to the drengr and brought a delicate hand to the scarred cheek. Her smile grew when the gesture made Eivor open her eyes more fully and her expression went from annoyed to something different. A bit of longing. A bit of hope, maybe. 

The warrior laced their fingers together - how warm they were, and soft, and how she loved touching those fingers. 

Eivor was very much aware of the beautiful face getting closer to hers, of the hot breath rolling over her skin, of the light but wonderful scent of her red braid. And her lips, full and made deliciously shiny by the quivering light of the candles. If she had known such terrible prose would be enough for Randvi to grant her a kiss, Eivor would already have given her enough pieces of paper to build a massive bonfire for the Yule festival.

But Randvi only pressed her lips on her forehead and pulled her hand away from her cheek.

“I shall give you what you desire,” she whispered in her ear, folding the paper again to put it in the warrior’s hand and make her fingers curl around it. “When you are ready to say it, I will be ready to hear it. Do not make me wait too long, Wolf-Kissed.”

***

A week later, Randvi closed her lockbox for the last time. 

Eivor had said it. The hesitation and the stuttering had turned her words into the most beautiful love poem Randvi had ever heard. 


End file.
